Seven Goodbyes (and one hello)
by esbis
Summary: Then again, there shouldn't be anything to feel when their goodbyes escape their lips. (again. and again, and again). But there's a hint of hurt, a ghost of an emotion, as if they're growing tired and desperate of something by now. (Multiple timelines/AU's)


The first time Jean shows him his art is the last.

It's a sketch of him, a portrait of his face down to below his chest, smudged around the edges and creased down the middle and it's enough to tell him that Jean is a good artist, because he wants to think so and Jean is so passionate about it and when one is passionate about something — doesn't it always turn out beautiful?

The dock is creaking underneath his feet and in the late afternoon, the sun becomes the color of Jean's eyes — rich and gold like a bottle of honey in the light. He's breathless, wishes he smells Jean more than he smells the salty sea, but maybe that doesn't matter when his whole world is Jean's arms and he can have this short infinity for a few precious moments.

In all the days they have spent together, Armin finds that this is the most crushing, most breathtaking moment he has ever had, so far, and he clings to the other's sleeves as if they were on the sea and he was what could keep him afloat.

Finally Jean is called back aboard, the voice gruff and ugly, shattering the glass stained with the colors of yesterday's happiness, and Armin feels the shards sear in his chest and throat.

"_Au revoir, leibling_," Jean whispers over the lapping of the waves.

And Armin can only laugh, tearfully, at the switch between their languages.

"_Auf Wiedersehen, mon amour_."

Strangled gasps and tears dripping down chins. The cold metal bars between them numb hands, even as fingers interlock and intertwine. Lips ghosting over wet cheeks, pressing lightly against foreheads.

"I don't believe you're a witch, you're not — oh God, just because they accused your mother doesn't mean you're — they have no right — the-they can't—"

A bitter, choked laugh that echoes down the stone hallways. "I'm accused of sodomy, too, but it's not like that makes a difference. That means death, too."

"You did nothing to deserve this…"

"I am guilty of sodomy, though." Murmurs against calloused fingertips. "You are, too. But do this for me and move on. Find a nice lady and settle down and live — live a happy, acceptable life."

The thick, heavy clamor of the bell. It is four o'clock. Strangled screams and fingernails digging into old wood, banging, pounding. "I can't — please…"

"Hey, hey." Fingers on his cheek. "Maybe…if there are next lives, our next ones will be better. I'll be sure to find you. And I'm selfish, but at least you aren't executing me or I'm not watching you get executed."

"You're absolutely crazy. I love you." Footsteps. Guards are coming.

"I know."

'Goodbye, see you next time.'

Jean peeks over the trench warily, squints through the veil of smoke. The stench of blood — he can almost taste it on his tongue, tangy, metallic — and it is just a bit less worse than every cry of agony and blast of guns.

*Damned Englishmen*, he thinks bitterly, scrambling out of the ground, dirt giving way underneath his worn boots. He runs, following the others, willing himself not to look anywhere but straight ahead or up at the mocking, blue sky.

That doesn't stop him from glimpsing a head of gold tarnished and matted with dark, rich red.

His heart twists.

Oh, the ship of dreams, the vessel to America, the land of opportunity — the Titanic. Jean is breathless, his knuckles white on the railings, his grin dazzling. Marco, equally exhilarated, is pressed to his shoulder — there is hardly any space anymore — but he doesn't care. They have done their celebrating the night before.

Jean scans the crowd for a head of gold, and it takes him a few moments to recognize his lover among the front lines of the crowd that has come to bid them goodbye at the docks.

"I'm going to sell art, get rich in America, and then I'll come back to you, Armin, and we're going back there," he said last night around the mouth of his bottle of something strong.

"That ambitiousness sounds more like Eren than you," Armin had laughed, hopping over his suitcases, "but alright."

Now he cups his hand around his mouth, looks at Armin and his bright, proud face, and yells down at the crowd, his voice melting into the similar farewells of his fellow passengers.

"Goodbye!"

They didn't get to say goodbye before the Berlin Wall rose between them.

Jean tried to go over it, once, twice, and on the third try he was shot. And on the other side of the wall, Armin planned, and planned, and made a way.

When the Wall came down, he couldn't find Jean. Not in the throng of crying people, not in the rubble. Never in the streets of Germany for years to come.

They have seen each other in buses and hallways in high school, but now they are the only ones standing in a cemetery in June, so it may be a different story. Jean looks up from his Marco's tombstone — it's been ten years, eleven years and he still misses him — to glance at the other man.

"Still miss him?" Armin — who he has had regular conversations with and who he may have found slightly cute in his thick-rimmed glasses in high school and even without them in college, maybe, but that was over now — murmurs. His flowers have been left on top of another grave further down.

"I probably never won't miss him," Jean answers earnestly, before snapping his mouth shut and lowering his head.

A breeze rustles through the leaves above them, and in the dappled sunlight, Armin's eyes crinkle as he smiles fondly. "I know how that feels."

They fall back into a sort of understanding, comfortable silence, occasionally picking up small, harmless conversation about life and other, more inane things. "Is Jaeger still batshit crazy?" Jean asks, almost smiling this time, and then Armin laughs, and it's like a refreshing splash of water on a day as hot has this, saying that no, he isn't crazy, just a little bit aggressive is all.

It's late afternoon when Armin murmurs about having to go back, _bye, Jean_, and there shouldn't be anything to feel when their goodbyes escape their lips.

But there's a hint of hurt, a ghost of an emotion, as if they're growing tired and desperate of something by now.

They let it fall from their shoulders as easily as the leaves did from their branches.

In this life, it seems as if Fate was growing merciful.

The city is suffocating, gray and black, neon colors cutting through the smog. Jean sits on a ledge, long legs dangling, heels scuffing brick, tilts his head up to the dead sky. He wonders if stars are real, or if they're another lie the system is feeding them — like those cleanliness programs. The river nor the streets sure aren't looking any better.

The boy with the old books, who he sees everywhere but never without Eren and Mikasa by his side, shuffles along the wall, paperbacks dangling from his hand, but he stops beside Jean's legs and leans back against the wall. "You might fall off if you do that, you know," he says knowingly, nodding at Jean's position.

"Right," Jean mutters, but all he does is lower his head. He still perches himself precariously on the ledge. The silence grows as heavy and thick and uncomfortable as the beats that pulse through the cheap clubs scattered across the city like mushrooms.

Armin's head touches the wall this time, and he sighs and casts his eyes up, too.

"What are you thinking of?" Jean asks, just above the growl of cars and buses, then chastises himself for letting that slip.

"That's a rather personal question to ask someone you haven't even said hello to, yet," Armin smiles softly, his eyes blue and clear as the sky in old pictures, the sky they want to live underneath. "But I was thinking of the sea. I've never been to the sea. I want to, though." The sea — not the disgusting mass of flowing garbage like the rivers here. He dreams of the sea blue under the sky, gold under the sunset, dark in the night. He dreams of foam lapping his ankles, salt and fresh air in his lungs, clouds white and pure, though he doesn't talk of it in detail like that.

"_Hallo_, Jean," he says after the pause, greets in his own language, destroying the short silence, like a pebble in a mirror-smooth lake.

Jean blinks, thrown off guard by the sudden change of his voice — but he likes it, nonetheless — by the glimmering blue of the eyes of the boy he has wanted to paint, to capture — and in the short moment he looks into them, it feels as if he has been waiting for something for hundreds of years.

"_Bonjour,_ Armin," he murmurs, and he feels the smile spread across his face right as he feels the warmth spread from his hand when Armin laces their fingers and begins to make him believe in stars again.


End file.
